Founded in Rattenberg, Austria in 2005, Garagedays have previously made four demos but 'Dark And Cold' is their first full length album. Their aim was to produce old school Thrash Metal with a modern feel, a choice influenced by a love of 80s style Metal.

My first impression - they have certainly achieved what they have set out to do and I really like it. Comprising of ten tracks that are catchy, rocking, with chugging guitars from start to finish and fun to listen to. It makes me feel quite nostalgic for the 80s (thanks guys, I swore I would never do nostalgia) but this has a modern twist to it so I forgive them.

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The album opens with 'Last Breath'. It's fast paced, full of chugging guitars and the obligatory guitar solo. A good start that makes you want to hear more. This is followed by 'Lord Of Darkness', my favourite track of the album; I like the blackened edge to this track.

Another excellent track is 'Blow Away', loaded with chugging guitars that break into an excellent 'old school' guitar solo. The wild card track was 'Black Bridges', at just under two minutes long the shortest track on the album, a slower, doom ridden number with dark lyrics; interesting.

You can hear strong Metallica and Judas Priest influences in the songs, as well as putting you in mind of a whole lot of others from that era. At times I even thought there was a tiny touch of Venom and Onslaught in places.

I enjoyed that a lot of the lyrics were, in places, of a slightly 'dark' nature. Their use of English was quite basic and in places a little confusing, but hell, it's still better than my Austrian.

All the lyrics were written by Marco Kern, the vocalist and rhythm guitarist. The rest of the band consist of; Dominik Eder on bass and backing vocals, Rene Auer on lead and Mathias Mai on drums.

As first albums go, this is a good one, a solid musical foundation to build on and it will be interesting to see where they go from here.